Different, but Okay
by Userman
Summary: Scott Starlyle, Pre-War ghoul, adventures throughout the wasteland. Starting with a trip to New Vegas, follow Starlyle throughout his adventures in the wasteland!
1. Different, but Okay

Scott Starlyle stood on the edge of a cliff, looking over the irradiated, godforsaken hellhole that the Earth had become. He smiled, though, because it was _his_ godforsaken hellhole of a planet. He found himself coming to places like more and more often. Maybe it was to watch the sunset. Maybe to reminisce about pre-War times. Before the bombs fell, Starlyle was an average guy. Neither rich nor important enough to make it into onone of the vaults. No, he sat and watched as the world fell apart. He was lucky, if you could call it that. Rather than dying off, like most of the rest of the world, he became a ghoul. It wasn't fast. It sure as hell wasn't pretty. But more than anything else it was agonizing. He didn't know what was happening, he just started dying. Cuts stopped healing, hair stopped growing, sleep became less necessary. For a while, he was in a sort of "Golden Age". He stayed the same, more or less, for about a year, until the radiation really started packing a punch. That's when he was really plunged into the insanity of the wasteland. civilization was already reforming: The yet-to-be-ghouls were exploring the surface, looking for a way to survive. Some traveled in groups. Some traveled alone. Everyone fought tooth and nail, though. Whether it was against others, the emerging abominations, or the wasteland itself, it didn't much matter. All that mattered was getting a leg up, getting above everyone else. Starlyle didn't much care for that time. Probably because he wasn't thriving during that time. He was just barely eking out a living. He had never been poor before the bombs fell, but he was sure this had to be worse. After the idea of a post-apocalyptic free-for-all began to fade, the pockets of humanity that hadn't died had formed extremely basic civilisations. None of the vaults had opened yet, and so everyone was either a ghoul or close enough to pass as one. Scott himself was part of one of these little groups, but they were long gone. he got a good look at what the bombs had done to people, and it would only get worse. The ghouls were then recognizably "Ghoulified" as Scott liked to say. At first, he had been pessimistic. It was the end of the world, so he definitely had a right to be. But slowly his bitter pessimism eroded and changed into a consistent glee. Yeah, it was the end of the world, and yeah, humanity was almost certainly screwed, but he was there to see it. And he would be there for a long time. That's what kept him happy. He had found the mythical "fountain of youth", and sure it was't pretty, but he felt twenty for the last century, give or take. At the cost of his face, it wasn't that bad. 

A few hours later, he was walking through Goodneighbor. He caught a few waves and a few smiles on the way, regardless of his drifter status. He was a regular here, or at least when he was in the area. He made his way down to the Third Rail, giving an amiable wave to the bouncer. strutting up to the bar, he announced with a smile, "Hey hey, Charlie! Got any scotch left? I'd kill for a drink. Literally." 

"Well of course! What do you think this is, some sort of seedy establishment? We've got all the liquor you could ever want! Scotch, neat, coming up, as long as you got the caps." 

Starlyle handed over the caps and nestled the glass right in his hand, where it belongs. He sipped it slowly as the night went on, buying three drinks total over the night. 

"So, you heard the news recently?" Charlie asked quietly, not looking up from the cup he was cleaning. 

"Nah. Lay it on me." Scott said, matching his hushed tone. 

"Hear there's a few folks looking for you. Said they needed to talk to you. Badly. Whoops," Charlie muttered as his cap slid off his head and onto the floor. while he hovered down to get it, he subtly gestured over to a seedy table towards the back. "Those guys back there. They look pretty tough, you better watch yourself." 

"Have a little faith in me Charlie." He said confidently, standing up from the bar and sauntering over to the table, drink in hand. "Heard you fellas were looking for me. Something you needed?" 

"Yeah," Said one of the guys in a deep voice. There were three in all each bigger than the last. The guy that spoke was in the middle, smaller than the biggest, but bigger than the smallest. He was wearing a gas mask that covered his face. The other two wore helmets with visorvisors, obscuring most of their mugs. "We got word a few guys who would pay big money for you, and we heard you were in town so I decided to swing on bye." His tone was friendly enough, but everyone knew what he meant. Besides one hushed conversation, the bar was silent. 

"Oh really? Mind telling me who asked for my head on a plate?" 

"Boss wouldn't be happy if you knew." 

"Alright, I guess it'll be that way then." Scott looked over to Charlie, who gave him a nod in return. then from the sleeve of his nice blue suit popped a plasma defender, the kind from Vegas. "You fellas ever seen one of these?" He asked kindly. They all shook their heads. "Special kind from out west. Plasma model. Kicks ass. Now let me tell you guys something." he leaned in over the table. "Everyone here is packing heat. If you shoot you sure as hell won't be the one cashing checks. You'll have more holes than Swiss cheese, bub. So you think about what you do next reaaaaaalll carefully. Alright?" 

Scott leaned back in his chair, waiting. After a few minutes, the goons got up and left, and he went back to his seat at the bar. 

"That was unnecessarily ballsy." Charlie commented. 

"Well yeah, but it's been at least two hundred years, so if I died, it wouldn't be all bad. Besides, everyone here loves meme. Speaking of, a drink for everyone, on me." 

"How do you expect to pay?" 

"Call it a solid?" 

"Yeah, alright. You owe me. Big time." Charlie grumbled. 

"Seems fair to me." 

After a few hours, a third glass and a lot of thank you's and smiles, Scott left the bar to take up his room in The Rexford. He was a regular here, so they had a room, just for him. Of course, other people slept there, so it was mostly an honorary title. But it's the thought that counts. 

He paid his fee, and with a couple of waves and smiles, he went up to his room. He didn't sleep. He rarely did. No, he bought that room to prepare for his pilgrammage to New Vegas. He started taking inventory of everything he had, and then after that everything he needed. The New Vegas trip was one he had made before. Not many times, but he had done it. He first assessed his weapons. He had his trusty 9mm pistol, stamped to his side in a handmade-holster. This was his before the bombs fell, and it was a miracle it still worked. He repaired it regularly but didn't use it much in fear of breaking it. Then he had his plasma defender, which he used much more frequently. This he picked up on his first journey to Vegas, and he didn't necessarily aquire it honestly. He kept it in his pocket, which wasn't really a great idea in case it misfired, but he kept it there regardless. after that came the laser rifle strapped on his back, under his backpack where he kept caps, ammo, and anything else he may need. His last weapon, which he rarely used but really loved, was a tommy gun hidden under his combat armor chest piece. He preferred mini-guns, but those were a pain in the ass to haul around, so he kept any he found as souvenirs, hidden in suply caches across the wasteland. He set these up on his first trip to Vegas, and has lived to love it ever since. when he wasn't wearing combat armor, he wore a faded blue suit, reflective shades, and a dusty cowboy-esque hat. It really wasn't a great fashion sense, but he didn't mind. that was one of the great things about the wasteland: You could make whatever choices you wanted and rarely face judgement. It was like a societal reset. For the rest of the night, Starlyle checked, double checked, and triple checked his entire inventory. He got an hour or so of sleep, which was surprising. He rarely slept that wrong, but Scott didn't complain. That morning he left around 5. Long before anyone else in Goodneighbor was awake, unless they hadn't yet gone to sleep. A few of the party animals saw him leaving and asked what he was up to. "Wherever the wind takes me. And, right now, the wind leads to Vegas." His answer didn't really matter; none of them would remember it the next morning anyway. Waving goodbye to the late-nighters, he left town for his adventure. 

A/N: _Hey! Thanks for reading the entire story, unless you skipped to the end. I have no clue why you would do that, but stranger things have happened. Anyway, there are a few things that should be cleared up. First: A lot of the story will focus on the trip to Vegas. It might end there, I'm not really sure. Second, I'm going to assume that the Lone Wanderer sided with the BoS, the Courier fought for independent Vegas, (Which may be against my better judgement; I'm torn between NCR and independent Vegas, but NCR seems at least mildly corrupt,so I went against it.) and the Sole survivor sided with the Minutemen. Now, I will right these chapters in advance, so by the time this is uploaded I will already be writing later chapters. Well, not entirely. I'll upload this one and then write chapters in advance. So, if you have a cool idea later on thatthat you'd like to share, I may not get it soon enough to change it, but you may as well try and get it in. Besides that, I guess you should just enjoy the story. If you don't, tell me why and I'll try my damnedest to fix it. Thanks!_


	2. A Trip to Vegas!

Scott Starlyle left Goodneighbor in search of adventure. He was going to the city of New Vegas, for the third time in his prolonged life. He was a ghoul, a human being so plagued by radiation they were barely recognizable. But that was okay for him, because very few people cared anymore. After all, it was the end of the world. People had bigger fish to fry. As Scott traveled, he usually hummed, or whistled, or sang along with the radio he kept in his knapsack. Of course, for a lot of trips, signal was scarce, so he sang from memory. Today he decided to whistle, and whistled an off-key rendition of almost every song that came up on the radio. To start off his journey, he traveled south. Of course, he could always plot a straight course to Vegas, but winter was fast approaching, so he wanted to stay south of any snow. This, if course, meant he had to travel through the Glowing Sea. Scott didn't need any power armor or hazmat suits, obviously being a ghoul. Although he didn't _love_ the feeling of radiation baking him into a crispy human biscuit, he could put up with it. He walked carefully on the bomb-burnt ground, always watching for anything that moved. After having to put down a few feral and a radscorpion he almost shot the head off a Child of Atom out doing some exploring. After apologizing profusely for almost murdering her, Scott asked if she could take her back to their home, The Crater of Atom. "Sure thing!" She replied happily. "Thinking of joining the church?" "Uh, no." Scott replied hastily. "Just passing through. Thanks for the offer though." They walked the rest of the way in silence. Scott always wondered how everyone there stayed human, and, more importantly, alive. _"Maybe they're just ghouls with makeup."_ Scott thought, but then quickly dismissed it. _"That'd be a lot of makeup."_ After a long walk in silence, they arrived at the Crater of Atom. "Thank y.." Scott started to say, but the girl who escorted him here had already left. After a moment of confusion, Scott walked over to Mother Isolde's cabin. "Hey, mama. What's going on?" Mother Isolde looked up from the magazine she was reading to face Starlyle. "Hey, Starlyle. What are you doing here?" "I was actually heading to Vegas. I'm going south first, I don't want to get snowed in." "Ah, I see. So you'll just be passing through?" "Yeah, I'll be out of your hair in a few days." "What a shame. You always bring the most... interesting events with you." "I can't just be a pretty face, can I?" Mother Isolde laughed. "Before you go, perhaps you could tell me a story? You tell the most fascinating tales." "Need something to lull you to sleep? Alright, but I'll need somewhere to sit. And a drink." Mother Isolde moved over on her couch and pulled a flask with an unmarked flask from her pocket, handing it to Scott. He took a look into the flask before giving it a sip. "Oooh, this is good. Thanks. So a story, huh? Pre- or Post-War?" "It doesn't much matter, either one would be exciting." "Alright then... One time, I was in the wasteland before any of the vaults opened, right? So at that time almost everything in the wasteland was untouched. So me and the people I traveled with at the time... We find a vertibird. Like, fully gassed, in the middle of no where, mostly intact. I think we were somewhere in the Midwest. So, one of the guys with me, he says, 'All right, get in!' but none of us knew how to fly the damn thing! So he puts _me_ in the pilots seat, okay s-" Scott paused as he was hit with a wave of dizziness. "Is something wrong?" Isolde asked politely "Uh, yeah, no, I'm, uh, I'm fine." Starlyle felt like he was about to puke. He fell off of the couch and onto the ground, looking up at Isolde smiling sadly. "I'm sorry. We had no choice." it sounded like her voice was miles away. Then, a deep voice from even _further_ away said "Alright, grab him." It sounded vaguely familiar... After that Scott was out cold and got dragged away. Starlyle woke up atop a mountain. The first thing he noticed was a yellowy haze. He was still in the glowing sea. That was good. Then he noticed pain all over. He felt like someone beat him up while he was asleep. Which was surprisingly accurate, because someone _had_ beat him up while he was sleeping. The third thing he noticed was that he was tied, both his hands and feet. He was also stripped down to his underwear, so nothing could get him out of this jam but himself. "Well, well, well," said a voice approaching from behind. "Sleeping Beauty awakens." suddenly a face was all he could see. It was the face of a man. He was muscular, tan, and hairy, he had a thick beard, bushy eyebrows, and long hair. "The boss is gonna see you now." He said in an accent that was undefinable, but definitely there. He lifted Starlyle up by the chains around his hands, and put him behind his shoulder, so they were back to back. "Got a name, bruiser?" Starlyle asked nonchalantly. "Yeah." He didn't say anything else. "Mind telling me what it is?" "Yeah." "Yeah you'll tell me or yeah you mind? You need to specify these kinda thing, muscles." "How about you shut your fucking face before I rip that jaw of yours right off, pal?" "You could say please." "You know wha-" Without warning Scott had broken the burly man's grip and rolled over so the chains fell in front of the man's neck. He wrapped his legs around the bruiser's hips and pulled the chain tight before cris-crossing his hands so the chain wrapped fully around his neck. The man stumble forward in surprise, and Scott used this to his advantage by leaning forward, making the big fellow fall face first. He choked him out until he quit struggling. then he slipped his chains out from around his neck, and patted him down to find anything to help him. In one of the man's pockets, he found a gun. A small, silenced .22. Not much, but it'd have to make due. He got it into his hands and, with minimal struggle, he shot the chain, severing it and freeing his hands. Then he shot the big guy in the base of his neck to be sure he wasn't faking. He gave him a last pat to find two extra clips for the .22. After that, Scott followed the path the big guy was walking along to find a big warehouse. Counting to three with the .22 in hand, he kicked the door open and entered the warehouse gun first. The warehouse was empty- well, almost empty. At the opposite end of the building were three people, two burly bodyguards centered around a ghoul woman sitting on a crude throne of various items glued together. "You! Who are you and what do you want with me?" The woman in the throne laughed. It was a raspy laugh, like most ghouls had. "You think you can get me with that little pea shooter from across the warehouse? Come on closer, I won't bite." Starlyle slowly, cautiously, crept forward, trying to watch all three of them. "Come on, buddy. You can get closer than that." After a few more rounds of encouragement from the woman in the throne, Scott was about five feet away. Then it hit him like a brick who lie was. "June, is that _you?_ " "Damn straight," June said, standing up from her chair to move closer. "And I'm better than ever. No thanks to you." "June I- I didn't- It was for-" "Save your babbling, Starlyle." She gave her head a quick jerk to the left and the ccorresponding man the Scott his suit. "Clothe yourself. And make it snappy." Scott hastily put on his favorite blue suit, and after straightening his tie June said, "You want to know why I wanted you hear, hmm? Take a guess." "Uh, because, I, uh, we-" "Specify who _we_ are, exactly." "The group. Our band of survivors. Me, You-" "Are you trying to imply that I did this to myself? Try again." "We being Me, Jerry, Luther, Martin, Leila, and Sam. We, uh, we abandoned you. In, uh, in the wasteland." "Yes, precisely! Give this man a medal for his astute scientific discovery." "Look, June, I'm really-" "Save it. I know you're 'Really honestly truly very sorry,' and 'It was a tough choice for all of us'. I don't care what ungodly excuse you can come up with. It doesn't change the truth. And the truth is, I kinda want to fucking kill you right now." "Oh." "Oh indeed. However, I also miss human company outside of these idiots." She said, gesturing to her bodyguards. Then she laughed. Although we aren't really human anymore. Anyway, I'll strike you a deal. You, in return for your life, will take me on your grand journey to Vegas. Fair?" "Uh, yeah, seems fair enough." "Fantastic. Gentleman, give him his stuff." One of the beefy guys tossed Starlyle a key and pointed to a big trunk behind the makeshift throne. Scott unlocked it to find all his stuff, exactly the way he left it. But one thing was missing: His Tommy gun. He lifted his head out of the trunk to ask, but June cut him off. "Your Tommy gun? Mine now, don't bother looking for it." Scott shrugged. He didn't use it much, but felt odd without it anyway. June pointed to the body, nodding grimly. "Choked the poor sap out, huh? Can't say I expected much else. You always were tricky." "Thanks, although I think my real talent is _juggling._ " Scott said sarcastically. "Maybe you could get a part-time as a clown. guitar all this mercenary garbage." "If people can afford to buy clowns, I don't think mercenaries will have much work anymore." "I suppose you're right." They walked the next few minutes in silence, before Scott asked tentatively, "So, how did you know I was heading for Vegas?" "Eyes everywhere." "Ah." Scott said quietly, but it was too unclear to actually learn anything from. A few more minutes passed in silence. "Hey, I know you said to save it, but I really am sorry for what happened. I know it was wrong and we could've helped, but we were scared, so we just left you behind. So, very sorry." June sorted. "Talk is cheap, especially these days, How about you show me you're sorry, eh?" "Yeah, alright. But, if you don't mind my asking, how did you survive?" Scott asked cautiously. "Thought I'd make good bait, huh? You thought wrong.So it was just me and those goddamned raiders, you pussies were taking of in your aireagle-" "Vertibird, actually." "Yeah, that's what I said. you pussies took off in your Vertibird, leaving me surrounded, when I see a guy, say, twenty feet from the brawl, watching. Looked like the leader. So I dash through the crowd, and run over to him, knock the shortest out with a punch and turn to the raiders yelling 'Anyone _else_ want an asswhoopin'?' And they all just accepted me as their ruler." "You trusted a band of raiders?" "Yeah, why?" "Uh, no reason." The two kept walking on, talking about earlier stories and having fun, but Scott stayed on edge just in case June changed her mind about sparing him, although after a while the jitters faded. Starlyle could get used to having company. "So, why are we going South?" June asked curiously. "Well, the snow is coming fast, so I want to stay as far away as possible from that." "Ah, got it." "That, and I want to make a stop in the Capital Wasteland." "Why's that?" "The free water. When we'll be in the deep south it'll be hot, regardless of the season. Water will be priceless." "Free water? Why?" "Project Purity, obviously. June, when is the last time you've traveled?" "God, it must've been... About 160 years now? Just a guess." "Oh, uh, ever been to Vegas?" "Nope." "Oh, boy." So Scott, now traveling with June, realized that this journey would be much more arduous than he originally planned.


End file.
